My wife and I decided, on short notice, to try to get to the Davis Cup tennis finals in Belgrade, Serbia, Nov. 15-17, 2013, and then spend another week or so seeing more of the country.
After a bit of Web surfing, in late September we got in touch with Glob Metropoliten Tours (Lufthansa City Center, Makenzijeva 26, 11000 Belgrade, Serbia; phone +381 11/2430899).
Two friends and I spent an exciting month in Africa, June 18-July 15, 2012.
We landed in Nairobi, KENYA, and stayed at the gated Flora Hostel (phone +254 720 071772). A Catholic-based center run by the Consolata Sisters, it is frequently used by missionaries but is open to anyone.
My husband, Jerry, and I used several methods to see the sights before, during and after a cruise with Windstar Cruises (Seattle, WA; 206/292-9606), Oct. 22-Nov. 8, 2013. We went from Athens to Rome, stopping at several charming Greek and Italian islands along the way, including Sicily. These places are so well known, I don’t need to describe their highlights, but here are some suggestions that, hopefully, will add value to other travelers’ trips.
The hotel in the Wes Anderson film “The Grand Budapest Hotel” is almost identical to the Corinthia Hotel Budapest (Erzsébet körút 43-49, Budapest, H-1073, Hungary; phone +36 1 479 4000), which opened in 1896 and was renovated and partly rebuilt in 2002.
This month’s winner is WILLIAM SOLOF of Golden, Colorado:
While my wife, Arlene, and I were traveling in the Pyrénées without reservations a few years ago, all had been well until our last night. No place had a vacancy.
We stopped and asked a gentleman, in fractured French, if he knew of any accommodations. In broken English, he indicated that a hotel was nearby and described it as “It stops the sheep.”
My husband, Leo, and I were going to take a cruise out of Istanbul, Turkey, and decided to also visit a nearby country first. Our choice was Bulgaria, which is small, uncrowded and loaded with antiquities and history. We arrived on Aug. 18, 2013, and spent the next eight days touring from Sofia in the west to the Black Sea coast and back.
My husband and I consider ourselves experienced travelers, and I thought I had gone over our itinerary with a fine-toothed comb, but there were a few glitches on our Oct. 12-26, 2013, trip to Australia that I might have been able to avoid.
In the article “Ten Cities in 20 days — a Delightful Custom Tour of China,” the writer said that at a particular hotel, she and her husband “had to perch on a couple of benches by the front door” in order to use WiFi, which wasn’t available in the room (Feb. ’14, pg. 26). I have experienced this problem with WiFi several times, myself.
11-day, 10-night bicycle tour (14-31 miles per day) through ENGLAND’s Cotswold district. Highlights: Meet in Cheltenham; ride through villages/Cotswold Wildlife Park/Hidcote Manor Garden/Bourton-on-the-Water/Northleach, historic wool town/Sudeley Castle/Iron Age fort at Crickley Hill/mosaic floors and artifacts in Chedworth Roman villa. Land (B&B), £960 (near $1,601) per person, double. Single, £1,151 ($1,920). Can upgrade to hotel.
